Category Archives: Poetry Lessons

Back to School: Four Icebreaker Poems

Get to know your students with these poetry mentor texts School is starting soon in most locales of the United States and teachers are busy gearing up to find interesting. low-stakes ways to get students writing. Poetry is always a no-fail way to encourage students of all ages to get back in the swing ofContinue reading “Back to School: Four Icebreaker Poems”

Back to School Poetry: The Sometimes Poem from YA Author Kate Messner

Young adult author Kate Messner inspired one of my favorite back-to-school poetry projects for middle schoolers! I’ve updated my post about this activity for the 2021-2022 school term with updated links and a free PDF presentation to download. I hope you try this project. It’s a keeper! Click below to read the post:

Movie Captions and Text Create Unique Poems

When text passages from a novel mingle with captions or subtitles from its accompanying movie, interesting things happen. Here’s what I mean: I always watch movies with the subtitles on. It helps me catch every word of dialogue and also catch every nuance given through the sound effects.

Teaching 9/11 Twenty Years Later

If you’re needing a round-up of resources for teaching 9/11, you’re in a good place. In this post, I’ve compiled links to all my 9/11-related articles. Hopefully, one of these will give you some ideas as you make plans to remember 9/11 in your classroom this year.

“Song of Myself” Videos Make Personal Connections

And then I stumbled upon something amazing: Whitman, Alabama. This was the inspiration I needed to demonstrate the importance of Walt Whitman’s poetry in American culture today.

The Dream of the Rood: A Dream of a Poem

Last fall, as I read and planned lessons for Beowulf, “The Wanderer,” and “The Seafarer,” I kept coming across “The Dream of the Rood.” It wasn’t included in our textbook, but since I kept reading about it (and it was included in my trusty Norton anthology, after all), I became more and more curious. Fast forward: my “Dream of the Rood” close reading activity is here!